


Maria Nunez, Daughter of Aphrodite

by reader1718



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-07
Updated: 2015-01-07
Packaged: 2018-03-05 14:30:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3123587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reader1718/pseuds/reader1718





	Maria Nunez, Daughter of Aphrodite

Maria Nunez, Daughter of Aphrodite

Maria Nunez was not enjoying the party as much as she'd thought she would. She'd begged to go to this party all night, but now she was starting to wish she had not. The only person who wanted to dance with her, besides her own brother, was his friend Chino, whose company she found distasteful. She was beginning to consider asking Bernardo to take her home,when she saw a boy from across the room who was unlike any one she'd ever seen before. He was not of her own race, but an Anglo--a white boy--yet somehow she was drawn to him. As she approached, she noticed the boy seemed very distracted, much as she was, but what she noticed most were the boy's astonishing gray eyes. They stood out more than any other feature about him. She finally dared to talk to him and found out that he had no mother, only a father, and had what he refrerred to as ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and dyslexia (a disorder where the words on the page seemed to swim around before his eyes, making it hard for him to read), as well as that his name was Tony Wyzek. This struck Maria as odd and she mentioned that the same thing happened to her whenever she tried to read. They got to talking and discovered other similarities between them, including the fact that she had only a stepmother and her real father. But just then something happened that would lead them to discover just who Maria really was and her true parentage.

Just then a boy and a girl whom Tony addressed as Annabeth Chase and Percy Jackson came up to them, and Maria noticed that Annabeth had the same gray eyes as Tony did, but it never occurred to her that Annabeth was anything other than Tony's girlfriend when she saw the way they interacted with each other. But then a team of rather aggressive boys shoved their way into the gym where the party was being held and muscled their way to where Tony, Annabeth, Percy, and Maria stood. “Hey! What the--?” Tony asked in surprise. But then the boys began to transform, turning into rather ugly, giants with bad attitudes. “Laestrygonian giants!” Annabeth shouted. “Oh great. The trouble starts already. Should've known that three of us would attract trouble like a magnet,” Tony said. “What do we do?” Maria asked. “In a word, run,” Tony replied, taking her hand and handing her off to Riff and the others, then running off himself with Annabeth and Percy, hoping to lead the monsters away from her. Unfortunately it didn't work, as the monsters split into two groups with some of them heading after Riff and the others. “Oh no! One of them must be a demigod! That's the only reason those monsters would split off like that and follow them too. We need to join back up with them and find out which one of them it could be,” Tony said, desperately. So they ran to join the others, whereupon they made a surprising discovery.

Tony got to talking to Maria and discovered that when he asked her a question in Ancient Greek, she understood him and answered back. He instantly realized she must be a demigod as she'd mentioned that her mother had just disappeared when she was a baby. So now that they'd identified her for what she was, they had only to concvince her brother to take her back to their home so they could tell her father what had happened. Bernardo wasn't easily convinced, but when he saw the ugly monsters chasing his sister and the look of fear in her eyes, he knew he had to act. So he hightailed it out of there and back to his apartment, where they told his father everything. Bernardo was convinced his father wouldn't believe it, but to his surprise his father believed it right away and made plans to drive them out to the camp, which Tony had given them directions to. Finally they made it to the camp and Tony, Annabeth, Percy, and Maria rushed right through the barrier, while everyone else was balked by it. This was proof enough that Maria was exactly what Tony had thought she was. Between Tony and the other campers, they managed to finish off the Laestrygonians and it was at last safe for their friends and family to leave. Tony introduced Maria to Chiron and they got her settled in Hermes cabin until her mother claimed her.

That didn't happen until two weeks later at the campfire, when all of a sudden a reddish glow surrounded Maria and the other campers stood back in shock. “What is it? Why is everyone staring at me?” Maria asked. “Die immortales, Chiron. Look,” Tony said. Maria pulled out the mirror-bright dagger she'd recieved about a week prior and looked at herself in it. What she saw surprised her. She no longer looked like herself. She was wearing a white dress with an embarrasingly low neckline, gold bracelets encircled her forearms, her hair was perfectly styled and her makeup was absolutely perfect. The biggest surprise was yet to come, though. “So the parentage is revealed. Hail Maria Nunez, daughter of Aphrodite, lady of the doves, goddess of love,” Chiron said. So that was why Maria could charmspeak. She was the daughter of Aphrodite. Tony had suspected as much, but he hadn't wanted to tell her in case he was wrong. After that, Maria was moved into the Aphrodite cabin. Maria didn't like the fact that it looked like a dollhouse much, but at least it was somewhat better furnished than some of the more sparse cabins at camp.

The next day she got into the regular schedule at camp. She had classes in Ancient Greek with Annabeth, training with Annabeth and Tony, metal working with the Hephaestus kids, kitchen duty one day a week, and other activities that alternated depending on the day. It was an interesting day to say the least. All the campers talked about going on quests as a way to prove themselves, and it seemed as if that was something they all dreamed of doing. Maria wondered if or when she'd get to go on her own quest. Finally she did.  She discovered that she was part of a prophecy that said When the god who guides the dead from life is taken captive, then death will cease; only the owl, dove, and horse shall be the tool that sets him free. If he is not freed, then the dead shall overrun the earth. Maria didn't know this meant, but fortunately the others did. They knew they had to save Hermes or they'd shortly have a huge probelm on their hands. So they did some research on who might want to keep Hermes captive and make sure the dead didn't die. Finally, they found what they were looking for--King Midas, who'd schemed to escape death by capturing the only god who could take his soul to the Underworld. So Tony, Annabeth, Maria, and Percy headed for Midas's palace to get Hermes back, but Midas refused to relinquish him. The man with the golden touch wanted to stay alive to use his power to turn what he touched to gold. His son wasn't pleased with what had happened and tried to help them, but Midas forbade him to help. They finally managed to outwit Midas by capturing things he held dear and kept it whenever Midas attempted to turn them to gold. Finally Midas was forced to negotiate. If he refused to let Hermes go, he'd have some new gold statues, sure, but he'd also lose several things that were precious to him, including his son. On the other hand, if he let Hermes go, then he would be certain to die. Midas realized that life would not be worth it if he lost the things that meant the most to him, so he agreed at long last to release the god, but Hermes had such a backlog of cases now that he would need some help getting through all of them. So the young demigods agreed to help him get the souls to the Underworld. They wouldn't have to actually go into Tartarus, just to the edge of the river Acheron, the river that Charon had to ferry the souls of the dead down to get to the gates of Tartarus.

So the group helped get each soul one by one down to the banks of the river, where Charon waited to ferry them across to the gates. Some of the souls didn't have coins to pay the ferryman and some of them had remained unburied, so Charon wouldn't consent to take them across for one hundred years. Those poor souls needed a lot of comforting, so the young demigods stayed with them until all the souls had made it to the shore. Finally Hermes said they were done and he helped them get back to the surface. They got him back to the Empire State Building's five hundreth floor, the modern location for Mount Olympus and they all got to see their parents. Maria was stunned to see Aphrodite and greeted her. “Maria, I'm so proud of you. You have resolved a great crisis that could have meant the end of the world. Well done, my child,” Aphrodite said with a warm smile. Then Maria looked over to see Tony and Annabeth in Athena's arms and Percy being hugged by Poseidon. It brought tears to her eyes to see such a sweet sight. All too soon they had to leave, though, and it broke Maria's heart to say goodbye to the mother she'd never known, but at least she would have her memories to take with her. When they returned the whole camp cheered. They celebrated with a feast to end all feasts. The celebration lasted long into the night and Maria had never had so much fun in all her life. The next summer she went back and had another unusual experience at Camp Half Blood. Maria had finally found a place she could belong and it felt wonderful.

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